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Between Joomla and Drupal for CMS

Hi,

I need to develop a brand new website for a client. The site will be Professional Brochure Website but will need to be professional and corporate in appearance and will have several pages that will also be updated on a monthly/weekly basis. I was going to code this in XHTML/CSS but based on the expenditure of the site this language would be too costly in the long run and no good as a CMS language.

I have researched forums and other sites and would like to get an opinion at which language is better to use for such a project. I am steering more towards Joomla but Drupal is there if someone can suggest the better platform for this project.

I will point out that the website will aim to get over 50k visitors per month so a strong platform is crucial for the future of this website as well as search engine friendly so the site can get ranked high on Search Engines based on Online Marketing and SEO.

I am confused between the 2 CMS platforms but I will point out:

the site will expand over time from 50 pages to possibly 500 after several years

The site has to be SEO friendly

Is JOOMLA equal in SEO rankings or is DRUPAL better to get a better rank for a website?

Is JOOMLA as safe as DRUPAL in regard to SECURITY and HACKING

The site will contain the following features:

It will have about 3 categories which will include articles that will be added per monthly basis.

It will also include BLOG page with post and no comments

A Directory feature of approx 150 Contact Details for Businesses and their website links

Example of the categories for the menu (split into 2 menus - horizontal/vertical and the footer):

Good point you have pointed out to get the people that are going to use it to test it out. In this case this will probably be me. I have heard Drupal is a good platform but has less experts as with Joomla but is more secure. Having said that I have used Joomla once but never Drupal, I just want to choose the right platform for the future of the site so there is less muck-ups in the long run and for the site to run smooth.

I'd like to respond to your questions directly - my expertise is in Joomla but I have been a co-designer on a Drupal project and have done a co-presentation with a Drupal designer regarding comparing the two:

* the site will expand over time from 50 pages to possibly 500 after several years

Both handle this equally well.

* The site has to be SEO friendly

I don't know specifics of Drupal, but the default Joomla install is not particularly SEO friendly, but that is easily with several extensions. I recommend sh404sef, which has a small fee.

* Is JOOMLA equal in SEO rankings or is DRUPAL better to get a better rank for a website?

I think that has more to do with the experience and knowledge of the person configuring the site's title's, tags, pages, etc.

* Is JOOMLA as safe as DRUPAL in regard to SECURITY and HACKING

Joomla requires a bit of configuration, someone who knows what they are doing and/or can read the excellent materials at Joomla.org. And a good secure webhost.
Latest whitehouse.gov is on Drupal. Not saying that Drupal doesn't require some smart people to run safely, just that somebody there thought it was good enough.

* It will have about 3 categories which will include articles that will be added per monthly basis.

Both would handle this equally well.
* It will also include BLOG page with post and no comments.
In Joomla, this would work by default, especially if you also don't want pings, trackbacks, etc. If so, there are 3rd party blog extensions.
* A Directory feature of approx 150 Contact Details for Businesses and their website links
In Joomla, take a look at MTree. Fee- based extension, but it kicks. We run a rather robest directory site with it and we're constantly amazed by it.

I think that there is no problem if you start the website using Joomla because it provides very powerful & easy to use features. You can extend the website according to your need any time during the lifespan of website